With Ármann Jakobsson on Rydberg, Tolkien and Some More

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Ármann Jakobsson

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Writer at Writer and Professor in mediaeval Icelandic at University of Iceland

AUG 28, 2019, 7:31 PM

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

Good day, I am just hearing Noah Tetzner interviewing you.

I suppose you know the Fädernes gudasaga by Rydberg, do you think Tolkien may have taken hints on elves from Rydberg's view of elves (Mimir, Volund, Egil and Svipdag!) as "nature smiths"?

By the way, would you agree that Rydberg's reconstruction was about as much more romanced as objectively academic, as Tolkien's own work?

Btw, would you mind if the correspondence, supposing you respond, comes to a blog of mine?

AUG 28, 2019, 8:58 PM

Ármann Jakobsson to me

I am not sure I have enough to say for that.

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Ármann Jakobsson to me

Rydberg was very much a 19th c scholar and far less objective than scholars later aspired to.

Also source criticism in Norse is less evolved then than later.

It could be argued that in his scholarship, Tolkien is far more modern.

He would have known Rydberg but I do not see him as much influenced by him. It could even be said that they use the same material to go into very different directions.

AUG 29, 2019, 9:35 PM

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

I was thinking specifically on parallels like Fëanor and Volund and Eärendil and Svipdag.

In the normal (as far as I can tell) tale of Volund, he is not a rebel against the gods.

AUG 29, 2019, 11:28 PM

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes there is far more influence in The Silmarillion itself

I did not remember that Rydberg interprets Volund as a rebel against the gods.

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

He did. In the usual version, his Mimer is not the wisdom before which even Odin bows down, and he is in fact revenging an unjust captivity, in Rydberg he's captive because the gods demand it to save the world from the giants and from chaos (forgot the details).

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes Rydberg is a very liberal interpreter

I had forgotten

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

He even bases traits of Svipdag on identifying a mysterious Od with him, like going to his mother Groas grave ... I think the methodology is a bit common with Tolkien, except Tolkien is perfectly aware this is not leading to Norse mythology per se, but to a possible and very tentative something "older" ...

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes that is true

Tolkien is much clearer that what he is doing is fiction

though he also sees it as 'true'

but fictional truth

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

I think in part he was seeking a reconstruction ... like Quenya and Sindarin of pre-IE NW European languages.

Laketown could for instance be based on settlements in Alps of Switzerland (currently dated to 5000 BC), with supplement from stave buildings like those in Trondheim.

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes possibly but he is not disciplined in this in The Hobbit.

As he tried to be later.

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

"not disciplined"?

how do you mean?

Ármann Jakobsson to me

I think Tolkien gradually came to see his work as a reconstruction of an older reality

He is answering questions from readers about this in the 1950s and the 1960s

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

I think he did so from the beginning, but wrote more to children in The Hobbit - or thought, perhaps I misread those letters, and you have them at hand?

Does he say he didn't think so when writing The Hobbit?

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Some of them are printed in The Letters.

I think it is very clear that there is a lot of afterthought in his whole creation.

As can be seen in the development of the Silmarillion.

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

Bc, precisely Esgaroth would be very ideal as a reconstruction of an older reality:

Φιλολoγικά/Philologica : Laketown, but not Esgaroth
http://filolohika.blogspot.com/2019/01/laketown-but-not-esgaroth.html

I'm aware of these by memory, The Letters, but while lots of things came as afterthoughts, I didn't think this approach came so?

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Well I would not know how consciously this was done

But it is quite possible.

Do you have a text clue?

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

Did he say "I gradually came to see" etc?

Ármann Jakobsson to me

His whole creation is gradual.

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

Yes, this is very true, but would be as true for sth which started out as reconstruction.

The PIE of Schleicher is very different frm the PIE (nearly Hittite) of Jouna Pyysala.
Pyssalo

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Well yes he is thinking as a philologist the whole time

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

Pyysalo
Precisely

Ármann Jakobsson to me

but I think he is experimenting and changing his mind and going back and forth

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

as do philologists when reconstructing

Ármann Jakobsson to me

And I think some of the elements especially in The Hobbit are slightly random

Like the word goblins

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

that is probable, but as to goblins, any reader of George MacDonald would have seen some likeness between his goblins and the urqui

Ármann Jakobsson to me

His elves are not as clearly demarcated as later

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

in some ways in fact closer to those of popular legends he recontructs from?

Ármann Jakobsson to me

I see him working with various medieval traditions

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

obvious

Ármann Jakobsson to me

which he also works with in 'Farmer Giles of Ham'

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

in a very playful way - as the Medievals did themselves and as he complained of Chesterton doing in Ballad of the White Horse

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes and medieval traditions are usually evolving and a great deal of diversity

ah yes, he must have set his teeth into some more detail which he found inspiring

You can see also in the appendices how he is continually thinking about his creation.

And refining it.

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

he is for world building what Wagner is for a very different type of Allkunstwerk

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes that is a good analogy
👍

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

(not that he liked Wagner's treatment of Niblungs)

What is common to Flying Dutchman and Ring and Parzifal is an attempt to make medieval and otherwise pre-enlightenment works speak again to a modern public.

What is common to Hobbit and Ring is an attempt to make them do so after far better philological research than Wagner's, plus hiding identity of originals to hide liberties he took.

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes the two men are first and foremost fantastic creators

who bring their own original interpretations to their material

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

As was Rydberg

Ármann Jakobsson to me

and Tolkien does so in two very different ways in The Silmarillion and The LOR

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

Sure, especially as Akallabeth and LotR do kind of double job as meditation on Apocalypse.

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes and he experiments so much with point of view

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

True. He gives both Gollum's and Eöl's more than some other give of their baddies.

Plus, uses hobbits as a standin, somewhat "in too big shoes" of modern readers, I think some noted?

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes he very cleverly presents the world from the point of view of those who know it the least

and leaves many things unrevealed which is not so common

because he knew he had the Silmarillion to explain further

and this enables him to contain himself from drowning the reader in tedious explanation

and keep an aura of mystery

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

which now, thankfully, can be pierced by the curious : appendices, Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales

Karl May used chapter beginnings for tedious explanations, but this is part of what makes picking him up first time a little challenge.

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes, it both allows LOR to retain its magic

and draws people to the other works

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

and allowed himself some liberty of further revision, if Wagner wrote far less "complete works" (namely operas counting as one each), it is only partly bc his operas are longer than Mozart's, he also takes revisions one further than even Beethoven, and Tolkien takes it one further than Wagner, or two or three further, even

Ármann Jakobsson to me

And both essentially create or at least popularise a new form.

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

In some sense, yes.

But fantasy was fairly popular before any of the Inklings, look at George MacDonald and Lord Dunsany.

Some of both Tolkien and CSL is basically a more Christian take on certain concepts in The King of Elfland's Daughter.

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes fantasy existed before Tolkien but he changed it.

He makes fantasy as serious as the historical novel.

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

His fantasy is more serious than Walter Scott - I think you wait to Umberto Eco's Name of the Rose before you get historical novels as serious as Tolkien.

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Yes he managed to make it even more serious.

I shall have to look again at Rydberg.

Thanks for drawing my attention to it.

Me to Ármann Jakobsson

Tolkien or Eco, do so, you are welcome!
Good night!

Ármann Jakobsson to me

Good night.